O2 Announce Decision Not To Stock The New Nokia N96
Thursday 04 Sep 2008
O2 recently dropped a bombshell on the mobile phone industry by announcing that they will not stock the must have phone of the year, the Nokia N96 when it launches on 1st October.
It’s thought that O2 are unwilling to subsidise the Nokia N96 device because it put all its eggs into one basket for the remainder of the financial year by using most of its subsidy budget for the Apple 3G iPhone. Why would they do such a thing? Well, there are stories of O2 losing it’s exclusivity with Apple if it fails to hit its iPhone targets.
This comes on the back of the recent activity that has seen O2 remove all of its 12 month contracts.
O2’s management group are trying to reduce the increasing cost of Nokia’s Nseries handsets given the lower average monthly spend on postpay. O2 believe there is no advantage in stocking the N96 if the minimum line rental is higher than its rivals to give customers a free Nokia N96. A source for O2 said: ‘O2 wants to challenge the argument that it is impossible to grow in the contract market without flagship Nokia handsets in its range.’
O2 staff have been told they will not be stocking the N96 because there is little profit margin in the Nseries as has been the case with the previously released
N81,
N82 and
N95 handsets.
Not too long ago O2 increased the minimum monthly line rental to receive free top-end mobiles such as the
Nokia N95,
Sony Ericsson C902 and
Samsung Tocco. However, it appears that strategy didn’t work out as they have now brought the prices back down with the exception of the Nokia N95.